


Useless

by arysthaeniru



Category: Tennis no Oujisama | Prince of Tennis
Genre: Depression, Other, Please don't read if you get easily upset by stuff like this., Self-Hatred, Suicide Attempt, Thoughts of death, Trigger Warnings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-08
Updated: 2014-08-08
Packaged: 2018-02-12 07:19:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,732
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2100540
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arysthaeniru/pseuds/arysthaeniru
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I think, deep down, you want to live. You just need a reason to."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Useless

The first time that Yukimura met Sanada was the first time that he attempted to commit suicide, one October evening, in the twenty-first year of his existence.

Honestly, the thoughts had been a long time coming, as he’d steadily lost matches to even his easier opponents over the tennis year, and doubted himself and his confidence and whether anybody really loved him outside of tennis, as his fans turned on him and his friends started drifting from him. He’d lost his passion for everything in life, doubting some days whether it was worth it to even get out of bed and whether anybody really cared for him, Yukimura Seiichi the person, and not the star. What was he without tennis really? Just this waste of space. He’d got _everything_ from tennis. He was just...empty without being good at tennis. 

The final straw had been when he’d fainted on the courts of the US Open Quarterfinals and was proclaimed to have relapsed into Myasthenia Gravis again. 

What use was he alive? All he did was lose and lose and lose. And all he had ahead of him was losing. There was no miracle cure anymore, no miracle surgery or some treatment. Nothing but shambles and pain. What use was he to anyone? He was just a failure, over and over and over again. And when he had no talent at tennis anymore...well, it just seemed easier to end it, than suffer on.

He knew that his sister would cry again, once the news properly leaked. His team were never very good at keeping his stories quiet from the media, preferring instead to use the news as a media hype. Yukimura had never minded, and lately, he hadn’t had it in him to care about his secrets. His parents would give him those pitiful looks, like he was already dead. And his old friends from high school wouldn’t want to live through that pain again. They would walk away. 

He didn’t want to see that. Wasn’t it easier to just end it in an accident, than have to let them watch him slowly die from the nervous disorder?

It was why he was here, near one of his hometown’s rivers. It wasn’t a fast river, but it was deeper than other rivers and easy to panic if he fell from somewhere. He knew one of the bridges over the river had an old creaky railing, that was broken completely through, big enough for a person. It would be easy to pretend to slip and fall.

Yukimura stopped on the entrance to the bridge, to take a deep breath and pretend to tie his laces, but in reality, untangled them further. He had left his phone at home, no point in ruining something expensive. He’d wore clothes that weren’t his typical style, so he wouldn’t get sidetracked by any fans that he had left. He was ready. 

He kept walking towards the edge in the bridge and shut his eyes cautiously and fell back, as if tripping. The world tilted and Yukimura forced his body to not struggle and to inhale as he impacted the water fiercely. The shock wracked through his bones and he couldn’t help the spasm that ran through him at that moment. 

The world’s noise was engulfed by the rushing sound of water, and Yukimura was swept along by the current and felt the water settle into his lungs. His vision was blurring and his ribcage ached and all of him was on fire, as the dirty water pinched him and squeezed him from inside-out. Yukimura hoped it would be over quickly. 

Instead, he felt arms wrap around his waist and pull him up from the water, until his poor abused body forced him to take a breath into the clean air. It was ragged and it didn’t help the pain, but it was keeping Yukimura alive and he could have cried from frustration, if he had had the energy. The other person dragged him to shore and Yukimura hit the ground with a flop, unwilling to open his eyes or even do anything. The water in his lungs had to drown him soon, if he just held his breath. 

Instead, that idea was quickly dispelled, as quick compressions on his chest forced him to not only take a breath, but also forced the water out of his lungs. He coughed up the dirty water, raggedly, grimacing at the feeling along his throat. Yukimura’s eyes watered and he had to open his eyes, as the compressions continued. He met the gaze of someone with brown, serious eyes and the compressions stopped. 

The other person pulled away from him and placed a warm, but wet hand on his forehead. “Are you able to breathe properly?” asked the other man, his voice deep and grumbly. Yukimura rubbed at his eyes weakly, and nodded. Yes. He could breathe, much to his misery, and his eyes were starting to focus again, on the very handsome face, of an older man with a firm jaw and thick, jet-black hair. 

However, his unwanted saviour was wearing a very familiar uniform. Rikkaidai’s high-school uniform, his alma mater. Yukimura wished he had the energy left to scowl at the circumstance, but he could only really pant and stare at the sky. 

“Here, let me help you up.” said the _boy_ , pulling him upright and Yukimura felt an overwhelming wave of dizziness as he felt the world shift around him and his insides felt like they were sloshing. 

He wanted to scowl at the boy for doing this. He’d been so close to death. So very close. But. He couldn’t. He’d pretended to fall; he hadn’t outrightly committed suicide. He couldn’t act angry with the boy. He had to be grateful. 

Yukimura forced a brittle smile to his face and turned to the boy. “Thank you.” he whispered his voice raw and cracking. 

The boy seemed fooled, as his serious frown relaxed a little, to a less intense frown. “You should be more careful in the future.” he reprimanded. “That bridge is damaged, it has been for ages. How are you feeling? I can take you back to my house, please.”

Yukimura had to concentrate on the boy’s voice. “I’ll be more careful in the future. No, I’m fine. Thank you.” he said, as he staggered to his feet. His hands were gaining back their usual strength and it hurt. “Shouldn’t you be at class? Rikkai is usually in session now.”

The other boy glanced down at his uniform and back up at Yukimura as he too got up. There was something in his serious eyes that was curious, but he seemed to quash it. “I was on my way home, actually. It’s the evening, sir. School doesn’t happen.” he said, pressing his hand to Yukimura’s back, “And I insist, you’re really out of it and my house is two blocks down. My mother can make you some hot tea.”

Yukimura shook his head again, gently removing himself from the boy’s grasp, with a carefully measured step forward, despite the weight of his waterlogged clothes unbalancing him. “You are too kind, but I will impose.” he said, firmly. “Thank you again.” he said, with a shallow bow, before he started limping away. The boy didn’t follow him. 

(X)

The second time that Yukimura met Sanada was his second suicide attempt, on a sunny Saturday evening in November. By that point, the news of his illness had leaked to his immediate family, but his PR crew were still deciding about what to do with publicity. His phone had been so clogged with messages that he’d shut it down permanently. 

The messages would have been filled with pity and hatred and sadness, in any case. 

His sister in tears over something he’d done and he wasn’t making her happy, again. His parents would be bemoaning the fact that more money was being wasted on prolonging his life further. And his coach would be worrying about the loss of an investment, it wasn’t like he really cared about Yukimura anyway. It was easy to replace one talented japanese ace for another. They didn’t need him. They just said that to pretend they cared. 

And honestly, Yukimura would have read the messages if they could have helped him feel something, but they had done nothing so far. Neither happy things nor sad things could really dent his newly-found apathy for the world of the living. He didn’t want to see it.

He just felt dead already, as if his soul had already departed in his first suicide attempt and his body was still stubbornly clinging to life because it was stupid. 

His phone beeped again, despite Yukimura having turned it off and Yukimura growled in frustration, and smashed it against the end of the table, not really caring about how expensive it had been. It felt quieter as he stared down of the shards of the phone. How apt that it was as smashed as his future. 

But now it was too quiet. He needed a walk, to escape the silence of his apartment. But as he walked along the busy streets, with his hood drawn, he could only feel more dead. Against the wall of one of the buildings was a large billboard, from a photoshoot a few months ago, before he’d been losing in straight sets to unseeded players. He’d winked at the camera, and seemed to ooze confidence and love for life in that perfume ad. 

It had seemed so easy to _feel_ back in February. He’d been alive and had found more interest in things. His garden had been thriving because he’d actually cared about the welfare of the plants. He’d gone out with his friends practically every night that he wasn’t training and tennis had made him happy. Even if he hadn’t always smiled, he’d been happy. Now, he couldn’t remember what it meant to feel happy. 

He couldn’t stomach food, no matter how hard he tried. Not really. He’d used to eat a lot in the past, despite his short stature and his friends had used to joke about where he’d packed it all. He’d laughed then, it had seemed funny. Now he just hated himself for it. 

Sleep was like a pipe dream. He just stared at his ceiling and wondered why it was he was still here. When he did manage to sleep, he woke up screaming, as he died, over and over again in dreams, where his parents and sisters and friends screamed that they hated him. Worse than those dreams, were the ones where he kept living and got forgotten by the world and just was reduced a vegetable in a blindingly white hospital bed. Those had him waking up, feeling empty and usually with a slight period of numbness in his hands and legs. 

He should have been in hospital already, he knew. His doctor was making pointed remarks about it. But Yukimura had been ignoring him. Once he was in hospital, it would be more difficult to try and die quickly and make it look like an accident. 

Yukimura kept walking past the streets, with a slightly renewed purpose. This time he had his camera, and it would add to the tragic accident story. Most people knew that his old self loved art and photos. Not far from his apartment was a completely abandoned and ruined building. It was a building hazard and technically people weren’t allowed inside it, but there were no guards or even people checking entry. It was someplace kids went for dares, and he occasionally saw pictures from inside there. 

It wouldn’t be difficult to pretend to slip and fall from a height. It would be faster than the water death he’d previously planned and his body would be more easily found. 

It was easy to locate and even easier to clamber inside the building. His heart beat quickly as he slipped up the creaky stairs, with holes and crumbling dust everywhere. Yukimura felt more alive than he’d really felt in weeks. Wasn’t that ironic? He would die when he felt the most alive?

It wasn’t long until he was at the top of the building, up on the crumbling roof, looking over the industrial city of Kanagawa. It had been his home for so long. Perhaps it was the stagnancy that had led to this. He breathed deeply, as he felt the air reach his lungs. He felt empty, like nothing. He felt free at the prospect of jumping and ending it. 

He took a step forward, camera in hand as he shut his eyes. Death was coming. 

His rapture was disturbed by a noise and he turned around rapidly at the sounds of footsteps from behind him. He stumbled over the edge, just as he spotted a flash of yellow and a tennis racket a few feet away from him. 

He collapsed over the wrong edge, and hit a crumbling strat of a floor underneath with his shoulder, severely jarring it, and he cried out in pain. The strat wobbled and was about to completely break off, when two hands grabbed his injured shoulder. The strat crumbled, and Yukimura felt gravity pull at his legs, but he didn’t fall. 

He looked up into the face of the boy who had saved him before, whose serious face looked panicked. “Hold on, sir!” he said, his muscles rippling, in the yellow rikkaidai tennis uniform, “I’ve got you.”

If this was an accident as he had been trying to play it, he couldn’t very well just ask the boy to let him drop. He didn’t want to live! Instead, he just nodded dumbly, and felt like screeching in frustration. In three swings, the boy had managed to pull him up and they sat on top of one of the more centre panels of the abandoned building, that was more sturdy than the rest of the place. 

“I’m sorry for startling you.” rumbled the boy, as Yukimura regained his breath and gingerly moved his shoulder, “I wasn’t expecting someone else up here. I practise up here a lot, and there’s never usually anyone else...”

“My fault.” hissed Yukimura, under his breath, as he gingerly drew his fingers down his skin and winced. 

“...what happened to more careful?” asked the boy, with a frown, as he tugged at his black cap and pulled it over his face. 

Yukimura scowled at the boy. “It’s bad luck.” he lied. “I’ve been doing this sort of stuff for ages. I’m just not particularly blessed by the gods.”

“The gods apparently want you alive, nevertheless.” said the boy, with a serious nod and a meaningful look. “Sanada Genichirou, by the way.”

Yukimura wondered whether he should offer his real name. Everyone knows Yukimura Seiichi. He decided for half of the truth. “Seiichi.” he said, curtly. “Perhaps they do, perhaps they don’t. Whatever.”

“....you might be in shock.” Sanada said, quietly, as he squeezed at the strings of his racket, as he avoided meeting Yukimura’s eyes. “It was a hard fall. I should take you back to my place.”

“It would be an imposition.” said Yukimura, softly. “How could I do that after you just saved my life?” Unwantedly. He would have been happy to die here. It was a nice place. Instead, the boy who looked far older than he actually was had thwarted his chance at happiness again. 

Sanada scowled. “It would hardly be an imposition. You’re hurt. And my mother is a nurse.”

Yukimura shook his head, as he stood up and checked how his camera was doing. It was still functional, though chipped and battered. “Just practise your tennis. Rikkaidai doesn’t lose, and lack of practise is the fastest way to guarantee defeat.”

He stood up and started to limp his way out of the building. “You went to Rikkai?!” came the confused voice of the boy from behind him, as he kept walking away. Yukimura didn’t respond. 

(X)

The third time that Yukimura met Sanada was his third attempt at suicide, one December morning. By this point, against his parents’ will, the news of his relapse had been leaked into the media. People everywhere knew and Yukimura was sure that he would have been furious under any other circumstance. Instead, he’d just sort of stopped leaving his apartment. 

He wanted to die. But he kept getting thwarted, by that boy who didn’t really look anything like a boy. He could do something not so active to try and kill himself, he knew. A noose from his ceiling fan. A pill overdose. A slit on his wrists from his razor. But the problem was...Yukimura didn’t want people to know it was a suicide. He didn’t want them to think about how weak he was. 

His sister would just feel guilty. And his parents would sigh about a waste of a life and people would speak about his weakness. As if they’d understand slowly feeling more and more useless. As if they’d understand how it felt to be empty, to be unable to breathe without feeling like you were a waste of space. As if they’d understand how it felt to be betrayed by your own body. 

He’d started dropping mugs frequently, and tripping, because his foot had lost feeling abruptly. He could barely press buttons and even the expressions of his face had become more limited. He wasn’t practicing tennis anymore, and spent more and more time curled up in his bed, unable to sleep or even concentrate on anything, except the spots on the ceiling. He just felt lost. 

And then, it came to him. A car accident. Simple. Easy. Public. Easy to turn into an accident. Yukimura picked up his rikkai jacket, dragged a brush through his hair and applied some concealer, so he looked more human and less like a zombie who’d been staring at the ceiling and eating a bowl of cereal per day. 

As he applied the slight makeup to his face, to make him look more human, it felt like he was like a mortician, slowly preparing the body to look pretty at a funeral. A car accident wouldn’t be so good for his body, but he supposed it was the thought that counted. He wondered how pretty he’d look in death. Better than he’d supposedly looked in life? 

He stared at his face as he finished. Yukimura couldn’t see anything pretty in the slightly hollow cheeks, the spots starting to form on his forehand and chin, the limp hair. It had been quite useless. He swept the makeup down to the floor and just walked out, perching the jacket on his shoulder, like he’d used to. 

As he resignedly shuffled through the streets of Tokyo, the jacket didn’t flutter like it had used to. There was no breeze, despite it being bitterly cold. He knew he was getting a couple of looks for only walking with a t-shirt and his jacket, but he ignored them, as he hunched in on himself a little. He knew that the best place to fake an accident would be on the fork towards the Botanical Gardens, because cars turning wouldn’t be able to see a person crossing the road until it was too late. 

He slowed down a little on the road up to the Botanical Gardens, timing it so he didn’t slow when he crossed the street, but still managed to collide with a car. Yukimura shut his eyes as he heard the car honking at him and there were screams of ‘look out’. He ignored all of them, ready to finally die and end this feeling in his chest that made him feel like the most useless being in the world. 

But the feeling of dying never came. Instead, he felt a shove of warm hands on his back, pushing him far and fast. He face-planted with the road and felt his jaws knash together unattractively. There was a warm body over his legs and Yukimura could feel the blood slowly leaking out from the cuts he had gained over his arms, knees and face. His shoulder was throbbing dully from where it had never properly healed and the feeling around his chest tightened. 

He couldn’t even _die_ properly.

The dead-weight over his legs moved away and Yukimura didn’t bother open his eyes. He knew who his saviour would be. Sure enough, “Seiichi-san.” said Sanada, as he shook Yukimura’s shoulder, insistently. 

Yukimura groaned. “I’m alive.” he whispered, his voice ragged from the effort of not crying. 

“Get up.” said Sanada, and Yukimura slowly rolled over, wincing as pain prickled him from everywhere. It was better than being numb, in any case, but it _hurt_. He had been supposed to die, not have to deal with the consequences of throwing himself out in front of a car. 

“Yukimura Seiichi.” he heard one of the whispers around the people on the pavement and he groaned and shut his eyes again. He didn’t need to deal with this. 

“Someone get an ambulance.” he heard another voice and at this, Yukimura bolted up, wincing at the pain to his ribs.

“Don’t bother.” he said, as he staggered to his feet. “I’m fine, promise.” Sanada’s arms went to his side to steady him, and Yukimura noted that the youth was taller than him. Was that really fair?

The driver had gotten out of his car and looked pale as he glanced at Yukimura. “I’m not pressing charges. Just keep going, it was my fault.” he said, through gritted teeth, noticing there were now people recording. Of course, they wanted to see him when he was low. Why had he thought anything else? Yukimura just pulled himself from Sanada’s grasp and started limping down the street. 

“Have you got no soul? Turn off your stupid cameras!” said Sanada, fiercely. “Would you want your car accident to be filmed? Have some sense.” Then he stalked after Yukimura, and Yukimura scowled at the other kid as they walked down the road. 

“Go home.” said Yukimura, with a slight glare. 

Sanada held out the Rikkai jacket that had fluttered from Yukimura’s shoulders in the accident. “You forgot this.” he said, quietly. 

Yukimura just stared at the jacket with a tired sigh. There was blood on it and it looked flat. It held no meaning anymore. He remembered when he’d been the proud buchou of Rikkaidai, and had held the respect of all of his acquaintances. It reminded him of having a chance to fight back from Myasthenia Gravis, a chance he didn’t have anymore. “I don’t want it.” he said, with a shake of his head. “Sell it as mine or something, you’ll get a lot of money.”

“You’re bleeding everywhere. My mother can fix you up.” said Sanada, again, his eyes boring into Yukimura's and Yukimura wanted to shake him.

“Forget it.” he said, with a growl. “I’ll impose on you.”

“It’s not imposing after all of this! You aren’t being careful at all.” Sanada said, with a slight glare. “I want to help you, if you aren’t going to help yourself.”

“ _I don’t want to be careful_.” hissed Yukimura, before he could think about censoring himself. He was just so tired, and he could feel the tears of frustration and anger coming out from his cheeks. Sanada’s face slowly changed as he realized what that sentence meant and his lips tightened. 

“Liar” said Sanada, coolly. 

“I was trying to commit suicide all of those times. You just kept saving me. I don’t want you to. So next time you see me, just leave me!” snapped Yukimura, as he grabbed Sanada’s jacket to shake. “Go practise your tennis and let me die in my own way, instead of languishing in a hospital bed.”

He dropped Sanada’s sleeves and made to walk away, but was stopped by Sanada grabbing the arm that was still slowly bleeding. 

“You’re acting like a coward.” said Sanada, his eyebrows furrowing, his voice and expression stern. “How many thousands of children are going through the exact same thing as you and still keep living and strive to make the people who care about them happy?”

Yukimura’s mouth dropped open for a bit, and a choked sob came out of his mouth, as he bitterly laughed and tried to pull himself away from Sanada. “Yes thank you, I needed to be told I’m a failure by someone else, thank you, I didn’t already know that my existence is selfish.”

“I said you’re acting like a coward, not that you are.” said Sanada, as he tugged Yukimura’s arm again, and pulled out a handkerchief from his pocket. He slowly patted at Yukimura’s wounds, letting the blood absorb into the cloth. “If you really wanted to die, I wouldn’t have been able to save you, Seiichi-san. You wouldn’t have let me pull you from the building, you wouldn’t have let me save you from drowning, and you certainly wouldn’t have walked away from this car accident, almost unscathed. I think, deep down, you want to live. You just need a reason to.”

Yukimura stared at Sanada, wordlessly, as the handkerchief pressed to Yukimura’s face and slowly mopped up those wounds, as Sanada’s other hand slipped down to grip Yukimura’s hand, instead of his wrist. “My nephew Sasuke is alive today because of you, you know?” Sanada asked, as he started walking them towards a place that Yukimura wasn’t entirely familiar with. “He got diagnosed with Canavan Disease when he was six. It’s a gradual eating away at the brain tissue, until you become a vegetable. There’s no cure. My older brother didn’t know how to explain it to him at first. How do you explain to a six-year old that he’s going to die in his teens or twenties?”

Sanada’s lips pursed. “But, we’re big in tennis in my family, and Sasuke loves it almost as much as I do. And everyone knows your story. Myasthenia Gravis at 12, but you pushed past it, and stayed strong until an experimental surgery got tried on you and then you returned to become of the ATP greats almost immediately. You’re Sasuke’s inspiration. He’s convinced that if he stays happy and strong, he’ll be able to wait until there’s a cure for him.”

Yukimura’s eyes shut softly. There wouldn’t be a cure for the poor child, just as there was no real cure for him. “But it came back. I’m still ill. It was only temporary. I’m still going to die. What sort of example is that, Sanada-kun?”

“But you lived for a while, didn’t you? Achieved your dream? You stayed strong and you pulled through. You’re a shining example to so many other people, when you pursue your own happiness. And I think you can do it again.” said Sanada, clearly, as he folded over the handkerchief from Yukimura’s slowly clotting wounds. “Didn’t the doctors tell you, when you were diagnosed the first time around, that there was no cure? Why will you believe them now?”

Because it felt fitting. Because he probably deserved it. Because it felt so hopeless to keep fighting, if it only kept returning. Because he was worthless and didn’t really deserve a cure. Yukimura looked down and breathed out, shakily. 

“Yukimura-san, may I formally invite you over to my house? Sasuke would really like to meet you.” said Sanada, finally, and Yukimura blinked and looked up, at the handkerchief he was being offered. 

“You knew who I was from the beginning.” said Yukimura, softly. The boy was a tennis player, what had he been expecting? Of course a tennis player from _Rikkai_ knew who he was.

“Yeah.” said Sanada, with a nod. “Not that you played at Rikkai, but who you were. But, does it matter?”

...Sanada hadn’t treated him any differently because he was famous, had he? Had Sanada only been saving Yukimura because he knew Yukimura was famous? No, that wasn’t true, he couldn’t have seen who Yukimura was, until he had actually been saving Yukimura. He’d just done it because he was kind and wanted to save him.

Someone still wanted him alive. Someone still thought he had a chance to get better again. 

“...yeah. I’ll take you up on that.” said Yukimura, quietly, as he accepted the handkerchief and pressed it to his cheek.

**Author's Note:**

> //handkerchief symbolissssssmmmmmmm
> 
> Idea stemmed from a dream and the song, Jisatsu Bushi by Mi-chan.


End file.
